A steel wall ? 4 miles long and 16 feet above sea level ? proposed for Mantoloking and Brick beaches would resemble this one along Route 35.

Written by

Kirk Moore | @KirkMooreAPP

It would be a buried Iron Curtain: a vertical steel bulwark, four miles long, cresting 16 feet above sea level, but mostly unseen under a continuous sand dune at the back of the beach, a last line of defense to preserve a rebuilt Route 35.

At a cost of $40 million, the Federal Highway Administration is offering New Jersey protection for the $260 million reconstruction of Route 35, where superstorm Sandy punched a new ocean inlet through Mantoloking and across the highway on Oct. 29. The cost would be split: $32 million from the feds, $8 million from the state.